When it comes to Internet Marketing or business in general, the hardest part is making that first move.

That first elusive move or action that has the ability to turn around your destiny.

Yesterday while I was driving to pick up my girlfriend from work, I tuned in to a local business radio station.

There was this talk show called “Stupid people succeed faster”. Although it didn’t say faster than what, I can only assume faster than smart people?

Anyway, the guy behind this “Stupid people succeed faster” talk show is a somewhat well-known local businessman in my country. I have heard of his name before, though I forgot where. Maybe it’s through the local magazines or newspapers portraying his businesses and how successful he is.

The radio show went on to talk about how “stupid people” with only junior high or high school education, because of their ignorance, are not afraid to try new things.

These “stupid people” are not going to analyze all the possible scenarios before they try on something new. They would just go out there and take action, and if any problems arise, they just deal with it on a case by case basis.

Contrast this with the way how “smart people” (you know those with bachelor’s or master’s degree) would do things. These guys would plan ahead and analyze every possible scenario.

They would not take any action at all unless everything is planned out carefully and flawlessly. As you might already knew, nothing is perfect and you can’t expect to embark on something new and don’t face any unexpected problems along the way.

That, in a nutshell, is basically what the radio show is trying to convey.

I agree with the speaker to a certain extent in that unexpected problems do happen, and we can’t be perfect trying to plan everything before we actually take any action.

I do, however, disagree that we have to take action without any planning at all. In my opinion, if you fail to plan, you also plan to fail.

My view is that you still need to plan what you want to do. Just don’t try to be a perfectionist trying to plan and analyze every possible scenario before you actually take action. This will lead to action-paralysis, and eventually you take no action at all.

And if you take no action at all, then you achieve nothing!

I was once a perfectionist-wannabe as well. I would over analyze things down to every last detail.

And you know what, the more I analyze and plan, the more confused I became.

Fast forward a few years later (which is now) I have finally learned to take things a little easier and just let everything flow without much analysis.

It does not mean that I don’t plan and analyze before I do something. I still do, it’s just to a much lesser extent.

If you take a look around the web today, you will find that there are a large number of blogs out there.

The reason why blogs have become so popular is because it is so easy to build and maintain that almost anyone can do it. Yes, even those people without technical background knowledge.

Now these blogs cover a wide variety of different subjects; ranging from blogs about teens who want to network with their friends, blogs about the hottest and latest music, blogs about cars, blogs about politics, entertainment, food, fashion, finance, etc.

The list goes on and on.

Whatever the topic of the blog, it can be categorized into two types of blog: Personal Blogging or Money Blogging.

Personal Blogging means that you are blogging simply for the fun of it. You blog because you want to share your feelings and opinions, because you want to network with your friends and peers. You don’t expect anything in return other than the good feeling it brings.

Money Blogging, on the hand, is blogging for the sake of making money from your blog. Yeah, you may enjoy what you blog about and you may feel good about it, but the real reason behind why you blog is because of the money it can bring.

Now let us take a look at the nature of these 2 different blogs.

Folks who are involved in Personal Blogging typically use free blog platforms like Blogger.com or WordPress.com. Using these blog platforms virtually doesn’t cost any money as you only need to pay for your ISP (Internet Service Provider) fee and electricity fee for your PC.

People who indulge in Money Blogging usually use blog platforms like WordPress.org This is different from WordPress.com in that it (WordPress.org) requires your own domain and hosting.

There are, however, in some few cases where people are also using free blog platforms for Money Blogging.

So which one are you? Personal or Money Blogging?

Or maybe you haven’t got a blog yet?

There are still people out there who don’t have a clue that blogging can bring in money, real good money.

If only they knew, I bet a lot of them would switch to Money Blogging, don’t you think?

For instance, when I told a friend of mine that one can earn money by blogging, his reactions was: “Yeah right, how exactly will blogging earn me money? Blogging is just for personal stuff you want to share with your friends and family. You enjoy doing for the fun of it. Nothing more.”

See?

My response to him was: “I’m serious, you can really make money from blogging. You just need to blog consistently and bring in visitors to your blog on a consistent basis, and when your blog gets crowded, you can sell advertising space on your blog.”

This is called monetizing your blog.

So if you currently own a blog but have not monetized it yet, why not switch from Personal Blogging to Money Blogging?

You would blog the same way you have always did, the only difference lies in the fact that you are going to sell some space on your blog for advertising purposes.

One of the easiest ways to monetize your blog is through Google Adsense. Every time someone clicks on one of these ads, you are paid.

As simple and straightforward as that!

There are other ways to make money from your blog other than through selling advertising space. I will cover these in later posts.

For now, just keep in mind that you can always switch from Personal Blogging to Money Blogging anytime. Since you have already made the effort and time to write to your blog, why not make some money in the process?

You don’t have to do any additional significant work. You just slap some Google Adsense ads and you are good to go.

And if you don’t have a blog yet, why not?

Go out there NOW (not tomorrow or next week), and start blogging on the topic of your interest!

Creating and maintaining a blog is really simple. All you need to do is just write your content and then click “publish”, and your blog is live and ready to be seen and recognized by the world.

Creating your blog is definitely easier than creating a site using Dreamweaver or Frontpage!

It’s really easy nowadays to create your first website with the different content management systems available. Compare that with the past when you need to understand HTML just to create a simple static website and you’ll feel so grateful that you are living in 2008

I highly recommend WordPress.org as it gives you a lot more flexibility and options to tweak and customize your blog according to what you want.

If you are just starting out, you probably have little or no money to spend on domain and hosting. If this is you, then you might want to register for a Free domain and get Free hosting as well.

However, if you have some money ($10 per year for domain and $3-$10 per month for hosting) to spare, I highly suggest that you register your own domain that ends with a .com and register for a paid hosting account.

Having your own .com domain name looks much more professional, and having your own paid hosting account is much better than free hosting because they will provide you with support should you have any questions or if anything goes wrong.

To learn how to install WordPress on your domain, grab my FREE report “Your First $100 Online” simply by typing your first name and email on the top right corner of this page. Turn over to page 19…

Traditional newspapers and magazines, which have been around for ages, make money by selling advertising space.

In the online world of Internet Marketing, it is practically the same. You can make money by selling advertising space on your website.

To successfully sell advertising space, you need to:

1. Set up a website of your own

Currently, the easiest way to set up you own website is by using a blog. I recommend using a WordPress blog if you have a little money to spare to buy domain and hosting. However, if you have no money, you can also set up a Free Blogger blog.

To find out more about setting up your WordPress or Blogger blog, you can grab my FREE report “Your First $100 Online” just by subscribing to this blog on the top right of this page.

2. Put in valuable content to your blog on a consistent basis

Now that you have your blog set up, the next thing you need to do is to put in valuable content to your blog.

Now pay special attention when I say “valuable content”. You must give valuable content that is beneficial to your blog readers, not just some rubbish and low quality content that you simply copy from another blog and paste it into your own blog.

By entertaining your blog readers on a consistent basis with valuable content that is useful to them, you make them happy they are more likely to return to your blog in the future.

These readers are also likely to recommend their friends to your blog if they feel they have benefited by reading the content on your blog.

The more people who know your blog, the higher your blog’s traffic, which lead us to point number 3…

3. Drive traffic on a consistent basis

Creating great content on your blog is terrific, but you need to do some promotion so that people know your blog exists in the first place.

When your blog is visited by a lot of people (hundreds or thousands) daily, you are ready to sell advertising space on your blog to make some money.

You can do this by selling advertising space directly without the help of third party vendors by putting up your own “Advertise here” page on your blog.

Some people, however, don’t want the hassle of handling the administration work of receiving payments, setting up and activating/de-activating ads, etc.

If this is you, then you can always enlist their help of third parties such as Google Adsense or Adbrite. They take care of all the administration processes, so all you need to do is just collect money if there are advertisers who want to advertise on your blog.

Today we are going to look at what traits or characteristics you really need in order to be successful in building a real Internet business.

There are 6 traits that you should possess:

1. Just do it

Human beings tend to over-analyze and over-complicate things and situations. This is especially true if you’re new at something.

Beginners trying their hands in making money online typically suffer action-paralysis. They are so afraid of making a wrong move that they end up not taking any action at all.

Doing something, even though it’s wrong, is still better than not doing anything at all.

If you just sit there and do nothing, you are bound to learn and accomplish nothing.

If you do something, you are bound to learn something and may or may not accomplish something.

Hello? Can you see how you are missing out when you don’t do anything at all?

And the other thing is that people tend to want to become perfectionists.

How can you do things perfectly when you’re just starting out and you don’t really know much about the subject?

Heck, even advanced Internet marketers still do wrong things every day, yet they continue to make money!

So my advice is to just do it! Just like Nike’s slogan J Making that first move is always the hardest, but once you start going, it will be easier consequently.

2. Open mindset, positive attitude, and a desire to learn

You must possess an open mindset and a desire to learn so that you can learn and absorb new things every day.

Your attitude plays a major role in determining your success in whatever field you choose to indulge in, not just in Internet Marketing.

Be confident of yourself, think positive. DO NOT say discouraging things to yourself such as “I can’t do this” or “I’m not a techie guy therefore I can’t succeed” bla bla bla…

Have you heard of the saying “You become what you think”? Well, let me tell you that this is very true indeed.

So instead of reinforcing negative beliefs that you are not capable of doing this and that, why don’t you install positive beliefs to yourself?

3. Treat it as a real business

To succeed in any endeavor, you need to focus and put a lot of effort and time in doing things that will eventually lead to your goals.

You must treat Internet Marketing as a real business, just like you would if you were to open a brick and mortar business.

You can’t say things like “Well, I’m just trying so it’s okay if I don’t do this right”, or “I’ll just try and see if this works, if not then I’ll try something else different”.

The problem with saying these kinds of things to yourself is that you don’t treat it seriously and if you don’t treat is seriously you simply can’t get any results!

4. Stay consistent

Do small things on a consistent basis to ensure that you build your online assets over time.

Success in the Internet business or in any kind of business is not about doing what is required only once or twice or thrice. It’s about putting in your effort consistently.

When you are just starting out, you can definitely start working on your Internet business part time. It’s definitely not a problem.

Hey, I started part time too 2 years ago

The important thing to always remember is to build your Internet business on a consistent basis over time.

Little baby steps can eventually lead to big results too.

5. Stay motivated

Initially when you are just starting out, you won’t see any results. You must, however, stay motivated and just keep on going.

It’s not because it’s Internet Marketing that you are not seeing results. It takes time and dedication to see real results, and it applies to any new endeavor you embark.

When you are feeling down or discouraged, seek ways to motivate yourself by going to your local bookstore and buy motivational and inspirational books, audios, or videos. You can also go to Google and do a search on motivational sites.

Get yourself pumped up whenever you are feeling down alright?

6. Stay humble

Always stay humble.

Yes, even when you are already making some money, do stay humble please.

Nobody knows everything, and by staying humble you’ll always be able to learn new things.

If you are arrogant, you will think that you know everything and that you are the best out there. When this happens, you stop learning.

Given the rate at how technology advances every day, when you stop learning you will eventually be left behind. When this happens, be prepared to say goodbye to your Internet business!

If you’ve spent any amount of time online trying to make money on the Internet, there is a high chance that you haven’t made any money online. Or if you have, it’s probably a few dollars here and there.

Am I correct in saying that?

Why do I say that? Am I here to disgrace and discourage you?

Of course not!

You see, according to Business Week, “64.2% of the businesses failed in a 10-year period”.

What about Internet Marketing then? Well, even though I don’t know the exact figure, I can confidently tell you that the failure rate for beginners trying to make their mark at this Internet Marketing thingy is surely higher.

Not only is the failure rate higher, they fail much faster too!

And usually these beginners or newbie who haven’t made any real money online are skeptical about the whole concept of “earning money online”. But hey, it’s natural for them to feel this way. You can’t really blame them.

I, too, felt the same way 2 years ago when I was just getting started on my Internet Marketing venture.

Anyway, let’s get back to topic of why most people starting out in Internet Marketing fail. Well, there are 5 few reasons why:

1. They want instant results

Most people want instant results. They read some Internet Marketing ebooks or video tutorials today and they expect to be making money tomorrow. They treat these ebooks or video tutorials or home study courses like some kind of magic pills.

Well, well… nothing could be further from the truth…

When they don’t see instant (or fast) results, they whine and say “I’ve tried everything, but all of them don’t work!”

Sounds familiar, eh?

2. They are VERY lazy and they don’t want to work hard

Typically, people are lazy. It’s fine if they’re just lazy and they don’t expect any results.

But when you are lazy AND you expect to be earning lots of money online, then something must be really wrong with you.

There are no easy money, both online and offline, to be made. If it were easy, everyone would be rich. This is clearly not the case!

There is no Free lunch, my friend. If you want to earn big money online, then you must work hard and work smart consistently. You must be willing to pay the price.

I paid my dues by sacrificing my TV time, my hangout time with friends, my sleep time, etc.

3. They give up too easily

When these people fail to get any or little result, they simply give up.

They complain (yet again) “I’ve done everything, why is this not working for me?”

To be successful in anything, not just making money online, failure is a process one must experience. There is no one who is really successful at what he or she does who hasn’t had any failures in the past.

Failure is a process one must overcome. Unfortunately, most people do not realize this and they simply give up when their efforts are not yet yielding any results.

Think for a second: when you were a little kid trying to learn to ride a bicycle, did you miraculously manage to ride it successfully without falling off the bicycle at all, or did it take you some cuts and bruises on your hands and knees before you eventually learn how to ride it?

4. They don’t know where to start

Most people don’t have a clue where to start. They suffer from “information overload”. I sometimes suffer from information overload as well

What is information overload?

Information overload simply means that the amount of information you receive on a subject is way too much, so much so that you eventually don’t know where to start and in the end you don’t do anything at all about the information you’ve absorbed.

This leads to action paralysis = NO ACTION = No RESULTS!

5. They try their hands at everything

Today they’ll read an ebook about making money through Adsense, and then they’ll start implementing a few of the strategies covered in the ebook.

A few days later, they stumble upon this site about Forex trading, and they start doing some forex transactions.

Then a few weeks later, someone offers them a video course about marketing on MySpace and they’ll try to implement the tactics in this course.

You get where I’m going right?

The point is: they’ll try their hands at something new, without going deep on the things they’ve already learned before. Eventually they end up nowhere with a little bit of knowledge here and there.

Now that we’ve taken a look at the 5 reasons why most people fail to make money online, it’s time for 3 tips on how you can reduce your failure rate:

A. You must work hard and smart

Understand that to achieve real results in Internet Marketing, you need to put in conscientious effort, time, and dedication. There are no such things as overnight success! Realize that Internet Marketing is hard, and that you must put in extra hard work in order to make real money online.

B. Do not give up easily

Do not give up easily. Strengthen your mentality. Realize that to achieve success, failures are inevitable. If you fail, you get up and try again. If you fail again, try again.

As the saying goes, “there are no failures, only feedback”. Each failure is one step closer to your goal.

C. Focus on 20% of the work that leads to 80% of the results

Do you know that not all techniques and methods of making money online carry the same weight? What I mean is that there are some techniques and methods of making money online that are more important than others.

Have you ever heard of the 80/20 rule: the Pareto Principle? This is how Wikipedia defines it:

“The Pareto principle (also known as the 80-20 rule, the law of the vital few and the principle of factor sparsity) states that, for many events, 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes.”

This simply means that 20% of our work determines 80% of our outcome. Conversely, the reverse is also true, which is 80% of our work determines 20% of our outcome.

Your task is to identify the 20% work which will determine 80% of the outcome.

For example, if you’re just starting to learn about Internet Marketing, it would be silly to seek out big name joint venture (JV) partners and ask them to collaborate with you. You’re still a nobody, and they are already somebody. 99.99% of the time your proposal will be rejected.

Try putting yourself in their shoes: what would you do if you’re a well-known Internet Marketer and a guy who has just started to learn Internet Marketing seeks to collaborate with you?

I don’t have to answer that right?

If you’re a newbie, it would be a lot better if you learn the basics of Internet Marketing first rather than buying that e-book about how to secure JV partners.

The point I’m getting is: think for a moment and reflect on yourself where you are right now in the Internet Marketing business.

Identify the techniques and tactics that you do not need right now, such as securing JV partners as mentioned above. Once you’ve identified these techniques, be sure not to spend time learning them.

Your time would be better spent on learning the things that matter most to you right now

NOW it’s time to TAKE ACTION and actually start DOING something that will REALLY help you REPLACE YOUR JOB on the Internet.

Running an information business can be really profitable if you know what you are doing.

Especially with the help of the Internet, things are really a lot simpler and cheaper. Talk about digital products like e-book, mp3 audio lessons, online video tutorials – all of these can be downloaded to your computer in a matter of seconds and minutes.

Still not convinced about running your own information business?

Well that’s okay because I have 6 great reasons why you should start an information business today :

1.

Look at the Internet. People are online searching for information. They are hungry for information.

Using the Google Keyword Tool, below are some results I found when I used the keyword phrase “how to” to search for relevant keyword phrases:

how to cook

how to draw

how to video

how to cite

how to dance

how to deal

how to dress

how to fish

how to hack

how to kiss

how to lose weight

how to make money

how to make out

how to make paper

how to network

how to paint

how to play guitar

how to tie a tie

how to type

how to videos

how to write a letter

how to books

how to braid

how to break up

how to build a deck

how to burn dvd

how to change oil

how to cheat

how to cook chicken

how to copyright

how to crochet

how to cut hair

how to date

how to do magic

how to download music

how to shave

how to smoke

how to commit suicide

How to type? How to download music? How to shave? How to smoke? – I bet you didn’t think there are actually people out there going to Google searching for these kind of information, did you?

And how to commit suicide? Well now you know there are even people who want to learn how to commit suicide before they actually attempt to do it

My point is: the information business is huge, real huge. As can be seen from above, people are looking for all kinds of information.

Say you’re selling information products in the form of e-books, mp3 audios, and online video tutorials. So your costs are your expertise and experience for creating the content in these products, domain and hosting (very cheap), some advertising costs if you have money (if you have no budget it can be free as well).

And to produce 1 e-book, or 2 e-books, or 100 e-books, or 1000 e-books, the costs are virtually the same as you “technically” do not have to produce them, since they can just be downloaded from your website.

What about mp3 audio lessons and online video tutorials?

Yes they, too, do not have any additional production costs, so to speak.

So you’re “technically” making 100% profit! Gosh, what kind of business can allow you to make 100% profit?

Even if you deliver your content in CDs, DVDs, or printed materials, you’re still making high profit margins.

4.

You work once and get paid on it forever!

Yes, get paid on it forever.

Your website is your salesman doing his job 24 hours a day, 7 days a week non-stop. He doesn’t need any rest, and he simply can’t fall sick.

And better still if you’re selling digital products, since almost everything can be automated. Your customer goes to your website -> he orders your product -> he puts in his credit card details -> he download your product from your site. And all of these sales processes are done and completed while you are on your vacation or while you sleep.

If you’re an employee working for someone else, you are trading your time in exchange for money.

If you’re a self-employed consultant with some kind of specialized skills, you are also trading your time in exchange for money.

There are only 24 hours in day.

The point is: when you run an information business, you are LEVERAGING on systems to work for you. Because of this, you can sell 10 information products to 10 different customers simultaneously.

5.

You can work from anywhere in the world (yes just like you’ve heard many times before, you can even work in your pajamas).

As long as you have a laptop and an Internet connection, you can run your information business from anywhere in the world.

This is not a dream; it’s very much a reality. The question is, how motivated or how bad do you want this dream to become a reality?

6.

It takes very little cost to start an information business.

You can start for as little as $100 to $1000. Compare that to running a brick and mortar business. You have rental costs, maintenance costs, electricity costs, staff salaries, inventory costs, capital.

Can you start to see how low cost this can be? And yet it can bring in returns up to 100%